Slain woman's father saw no joy in death of the inmate charged with her murder

Photograph of Pamela Sue Schmidt taken from the facebook created for scholarship award named for her that is given out by the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations.

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UNION COUNTY — In the nearly three years since Pamela Schmidt was killed in the Cranford home of her ex-boyfriend, her father Werner Schmidt has focused on remembering good times with his daughter, and the memorial scholarship established in her name at Rutgers University.

Werner Schmidt has had no time to dwell on the ex-boyfriend, William "Bill" Parisio, who was being held in the Union County jail while awaiting trial for the 2011 murder.

So when Schmidt learned that Parisio died Monday, the Warren Township father said he had to think briefly and then ask, "Bill who?"

Although friends and relatives had repeatedly asked Schmidt when his daughter's accused killer would be tried, he said he refused to think about it.

"Everybody kept bugging me. I'd say, 'I don't care.' As long as he was in jail, I had no animosity toward him," Schmidt said last week.

Within months after the 22-year-old woman's death, the state enacted Pamela's Law, outlawing "bath salts" designer drugs that can mimic methamphetamines, powerful stimulants that cause severe psychotic episodes. Shortly after the killing, Parisio's mother, Diane Parisio, said her son had been using the drugs.

Werner Schmidt said he felt sorrow for Parisio's mother who, like Schmidt and his wife, Marcy, now must live with the loss of a child.

Diane Parisio, who has since moved from Cranford, declined comment after her 25-year-old son's death, but was quick to praise the Schmidts.

"They're lovely people. They've always been lovely people," she said.

Schmidt disclosed that on that night of March 12, 2011, his daughter went to see Parisio to end their relationship.

Schmidt said his daughter had tried unsuccessfully to help Parisio with his drug problems. She planned to return home that night but instead stayed in Parisio's finished basement, the father said. Pamela Schmidt also texted her sister, saying she was glad to have ended the relationship with Parisio, the father said.

The next morning, however, the Rutgers University senior was found dead in the basement. Months later, authorities said Pamela Schmidt died after Parisio struck her with a 12-pound dumbbell, and then strangled her. In a twist, authorities said Parisio had no trace of "bath salts" in his system at the time of the homicide.

Parisio was arrested the day after Pamela Schmidt's body was found. He was charged with murder and was being held at Union County jail in Elizabeth on $400,000 bail.

On Monday, officers rushed Parisio from the jail to Trinitas Hospital in Elizabeth, where he was pronounced dead later that day. Authorities have said there was no significant trauma to his body and they are awaiting toxicology tests to determine the cause of death. Authorities said Parisio's death is under investigation and no other details are being released.

Since their daughter's death, Schmidt and his wife have carried on, in part, for their other children: Stephanie, now a senior about to graduate from the University of Delaware, and Michael, a senior at Watchung Hills High School, who played on the school football and wrestling teams and is preparing for the spring track season.

With help from friends, relatives and Rutgers University, the Schmidts established the Pamela Sue Schmidt Award for Outstanding Public Service to provide a scholarship to a student at the School of Management and Labor Relations, where their daughter had been accepted into a master's program. The school has matched the money raised for the award. Rutgers officials say about $25,000 has been raised for fund. Pamela Schmidt died just months before she would have graduated with degrees in labor studies and employment relations.

"Pamela's name will live on. It gives you hope that something's out there," Werner Schmidt said. However it sounds, he said, he still occasionally feels his daughter's presence.